LiveCD won't boot - my experience

[kbunt]

I've burned a few copies of the latest Kubuntu, Kubuntu 8.10 LiveCD but I cannot boot up to the desktop. It goes as far as the Kubuntu 'splashy?' title screen and the bars go across but that's it. The screen turns black and nothing happens for a few seconds but the drive lights are flickering. The the screen goes either dark grey with dashes everywhere or light grey with white dashes everwhere. I think selecting 'boot up in safe graphics mode' results in the latter or the light grey screen with white dashes all over the screen.

I can add at the end of the kernel boot line, 'vga=785' and then it will boot up. I tried CTRL-ALT-F1 (or something like that) and got out of the kdm/X but I wasnt' sure what to do then. 'kdm start' won't start up the kde desktop.

I've given up since I can boot up Ubuntu, Mepis 8, Fedora 10 (LiveKDE or amd64), sidux and presumably (I can install) Debian. I wanted to try a kde and debian-based distro that has a 64-bit version. I guess my plan now is to install Ubuntu 64-bit version and install the kde desktop.

I hope that I can provide some info that will interest any kubuntu designers/developers/users/admins.

Some of the things I enjoyed about Kubuntu were the number of options of installing Nvidia cards. Also, I liked how easy it was to mount my drives and CD/DVD burners. The support for Kubuntu/Ubuntu is great so for a dummy like me, I could usually find what I needed or if not, I would google and look around. I haven't found any info related to my problem but I still insist there is something inherent in the latest Kubuntu that prevents a proper boot.

My hardware: Intel-based, Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3R mobo (quite popular and common)
Nvidia EVGA 7950GT w/ aftermarket cooler, Samsung 22" LCD monitor using DVI cable
Audigy 2ZS sound card, all SATA drives (HDD and CD/DVD burner)
520w Corsair HX520 PSU
Belkin F5D4000 ver. 4 wireless usb adapter

I assume the main and related hardware components are the video card, the LCD monitor and maybe the DVI cable. But, what is telling for me is that the other distros boot with no trouble. I don't have to change any settings or options in the other distros. They boot up after waiting or pressing enter.

If anyone has any ideas or would like further info about the boot problem, let me know. But, my plan is to try Ubuntu 8.10 and KDE so that will be my focus. Failing that, I'll look at Mepis, Debian 'Testing' and sidux. I think Ubuntu will work though and if worst comes to worst, I always have the option of using Gnome... :-X

[toad]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

Granted, you've been thrown into the deep end :P

It appears to be your graphics card (I know, brilliant deduction ) Anyhow, you managed to get into the live CD root shell. That is good. From here you may want to try to install envy. For instructions have a look at dibl's post http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3099811.0 You are interested in point #7 from stage 2 onwards. It won't take long to give it a go...

Alternative: have you tried the alternate download CD?

[kbunt]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

Hey, what is the kernel of the latest LiveCD release?

I booted up 8.10 KDE and the kernel shows as 2.27.7 (2.27.7-7-generic). Is this the latest release?

I had some betas before so I wanted to make sure the release was booting up.

I didn't enter the 'vga = xxx' line. But, I upgraded my firmware on my DVD burner. I doubt that made a difference as it may be just a coincidence. But, it's odd that I was able to boot by just pressing enter and using the default.

My resolution is 800 x 600 now and it's at 61Hz (strange number and I wonder if that figure has something to do with the tearing?). I suppose it's really 60Hz? Anyway, the tearing is ongoing especially when I type (understandable since the screen has to 're-paint' itself).

The only major issue left is tearing all over the place on the lcd monitor screen. It's really bad. What is causing that and what does that indicate?

I'm just trying to help the developers or any users who have similar problems/issues. I think I might file a bug for the tearing. Or maybe this issue is already known?

My wireless worked when I edited my configuration. I guess there is built-in scanning which I like.

The KDE menu (when you click the 'K') went all screwy black (covered in black colours mixed with orange/green or something) when I first clicked it after the boot up. I posted about that already, though. I think it's not Kubuntu-centric either since it happens to me in Fedora 9 KDE version. Nvidia drivers are installed there, too, so I have no idea what is going on.

Anyway, I just thought I'd post the new development. Thanks toad, for your comments and suggestions. If you know anything about the tearing, I'd be interested in knowing about it. Do you think it's to do with my video configuration, the default one that is chosen to load? Would upgrading or a proper install of the Nvidia drivers solve it, perhaps? Maybe not the KDE menu 'black colour mishmash' (I wonder if it's a bug of KDE 4?) but hopefully the tearing.

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

I tried the Live CD last night and didn't even get that far. I saw the splash screen and the initial menu. I selected to run the Live CD first instead of installing Kubuntu. After a few moments, a bunch of graphical gibberish was displayed on my screen and stayed there. The CD kept spinning on and on, but my display was hosed completely, so I couldn't tell what was happening.

It's not like I have a weird video card. It's a nVidia 7900 GS. The PCLinuxOS Live CD works just fine. I'm surprised that the Kubuntu Live CD acts so weird. I'm tempted to go ahead and try an install just to see what happens. I already have some partitions available for that purpose.

[dibl]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

Before you install (if it's not too late) try some of the boot codes. When the Live CD boots to the text menu, press F6 and try these, one at a time:

xforcevesa

if it doesn't like that one, try

vga=785

and if that doesn't work

vga=791

The first one might do the trick. Whichever one works, you'll have to add it to the kernel boot line in /boot/grub/menu.lst after you install. See #2 here.

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

I'll give those ideas a shot. Thanks!

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

No luck. xforcevesa resulted in an entirely different type of graphical gibberish. vga=785 resulted in a large, non-flashing cursor in the top left corner. vga=791 resulted in a small, non-flashing cursor in the top left corner.

Maybe Kubuntu just isn't for me. PCLinuxOS works just fine, but I wanted to try something different. I can't stand GNOME, so I'm not going to try the regular Ubuntu distribution.

Maybe I should download the stable 8.04 and give that a shot, but I really wanted to see KDE 4.1 or maybe even 4.2.

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

FYI, the 8.04 live CD was able to start with no modifications. Something about 8.10 does not like my 7900 GS video card, I guess. I really just wanted to see KDE 4. That's not available with PCLinuxOS yet and I'd really like to try 4.1, maybe even 4.2. Other than the more recent versions of KDE, I don't see anything in Kubuntu that would make me want to switch. I have heard that KDE 4.1 is really nice looking, though.

[dibl]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

If you want try the 8.10 Live CD again, and use either vga=785 or vga=791, it would be interesting to see whether there is a CLI interface hiding behind that upper-left cursor. When you see it, try Alt-F1, and if that doesn't do anything, try Ctrl-Alt-F1. If it happens to show you a CLI with prompt, try a

startx

at the prompt.

Also check vga=788 and vga=794.

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

I'll give those a shot just for grins. Thanks for the tips.

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

I tried vga=785 and hit those keys you suggested. It allowed me to see the console. The system was actually starting up, but I hadn't been able to see so earlier. So far, I've been able to install 8.10 and was happy to see that it downloaded the drivers for my video card. However, I'm not able to raise the resolution above 1024x768, and the refresh rate is really low.

Here are the issues I've noticed after just barely diving in:

1. Resolution and refresh rate
2. Some icons on my menu bar kind of freaked out are are now nothing more than dark blue squares
3. I don't know how to update this system. With Synaptic, you simply hit "Mark All Upgrades" and then hit Apply. I have no idea how to do anything with Adept. It wasn't clear how to simply upgrade the existing software.

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

I restarted X by hitting ctrl+alt+backspace. That brought back my taskbar icons, but then a couple of them got corrupted again. This time I saw that the system checks for upgrades on its own and prompts me to install them. Very cool! So, I'm installing the updates now. If I still have display issues after the update, I'll install the other available proprietary nvidia driver and see if that fixes it.

[dibl]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

Good -- I thought if you get it past the video issues, it would be fine. For some reason, those 7950s seem to be a source of considerable troubles, while other Nvidia cards are less so.

Synaptic and Adept Manager are both GUI front ends for the dpkg package manager. It also has the command line apt-get system, which is a good one when you're stuck with no video. You can learn all about it with

man apt-get

[neiby]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

I need to report a KDE bug. Kmix crashes every time I update my video drivers. How do I determine which version of KDE I'm running? I thought it was either 4.1.2 or 4.1.3, but I don't know how to find out.

[dibl]

Re: LiveCD won't boot - my experience

That's pretty weird!

OK, any KDE package, when you click "help>about", will offer to show you the version of KDE that is running.